


Between Scylla and Charybdis

by Noavital



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Drowning, Mouth to Mouth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-05
Updated: 2013-05-05
Packaged: 2017-12-10 12:28:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/786060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Noavital/pseuds/Noavital
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>To his defense, he is a good swimmer. To his defense, the killer he was tracking had hit him pretty hard in the head. Disoriented, he fell off the rock shelf into the water below, and he wasted the critical few seconds in a daze from the blow. When he came back to his senses the currents and the strong waves of the stormy day were already carrying him away across the enormous lake, mercilessly rendering his attempts to swim away pitiful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Between Scylla and Charybdis

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a Fill to a prompt in the Hannibal kinkmeme on Dreamwidth: "This prompt is probably a bit ridiculous and kind of difficult to build a context, but could we have a fic with Will somehow drowning/almost drowning and Hannibal takes part in the rescue? Thank you!"
> 
> First Hannibal fic, though most definitely not the first ever fic. Not romantic - unless you really squint in the mouth to mouth bit.

Will spent the vast majority of his childhood and adolescence by the sea. Boats were an inseparable part of half his life, as his father had worked at the boat yards in the southern ports, and because of this Will had become a fairly good swimmer. That's what he tells himself as he fights the currents to no avail, desperately trying to get back to shore.

To his defense, he is a good swimmer. To his defense, the killer he was tracking had hit him pretty hard in the head. Disoriented, he fell off the rock shelf into the water below, and he wasted the critical few seconds in a daze from the blow. When he came back to his senses the currents and the strong waves of the stormy day were already carrying him away across the enormous lake, mercilessly rendering his attempts to swim away pitiful. It also didn't help that the water he was submerged into was absolutely freezing, and that his body was now beginning to go numb from the cold.

He really should have told someone he was setting out on his own. Why was he setting out on his own? Realization had struck him so abruptly that there was no time to call Jack or anyone else from the bureau. He needed to act quickly (and discreetly – ten FBI agents barging in would destroy their chance and the clever killer would escape, using his no doubt prepared-in-advance getaway plan). Now he can't remember anything more idiotic he had ever done in his life than not telling anyone where he was going. It was stupid, and reckless, and in rough calculation it would be at least half a day before anyone noticed he was gone. It's a scary thought, but Will orders the panic away in his head. Panicking will only make things worse than they are now, and things are at nine at the one-to-ten bad scale. He tries to shout, but when he arrived at the lake there was no one else there besides him and the killer. And even if there is anyone there, Will doubts that they'll hear him. He shouldn't have gone, but he was getting so close! The temptation was too large, even for Will Graham.

The opportunity to catch the serial killer who violated the corpses of the children he killed – Will needed to take it. He felt such stunning amount of joy when he was him, slashing those children's faces slowly, intimately with that rusty razor and then cutting their throats, when rivers of their blood ran down his arms. What his empathy couldn't tell him was how strong his opponent was, and how overwhelming his blow would be. What it could do was to send Will off his balance with more nightmares than his mind was big enough to contain. And it didn't even get rid of the stag – the nightmares just mixed all together in his head into a blurry haze of blood and fear. But he couldn't let the deteriorating health of his subconscious paralyze him, and chose the other way; in this profession, if you freeze, you die.

And Will is, unfortunately, freezing – it's the beginning of winter and the water is cold and at the brink of turning to ice. He's swallowing more water than he's swimming through, and they send chills through his soaked body. His legs are getting tired, more numb, and now he can't keep the panic out anymore, not when he's struggling to stay above the water and gasping for air. He doesn't want to shout for help – shouting wastes precious air – but he can't get out of this on his own. He can't tell if it's been minutes or hours, and he can swear that no matter how fast he's swimming, the shore just keeps getting further and further away. His teeth are chattering as if they are trying to race his heartbeat that is currently soaring, from effort and from cold and from sheer fear. He can't believe he's going to die drowning – somehow he always saw himself going out in a blaze of the precarious profession he was in of gunfire and bullets.

Eventually his legs stop moving. He can't help it, they just do. His hands give out as well. He's so cold he can't even feel them, and to his dismay, it's starting to drape on the edge of his consciousness. He can't even be frightened properly because his mind is drowning as well. Every inch of him is going under, inside and out. He keeps telling himself, _Stay above the water. Breathe, keep moving._ But the words are empty and it's no use – his mind is already crippled by the cold and Will is tired, so very tired.

Life doesn't flash before his eyes like the cliché assumes they should. Will sees nothing but black.

  
**__________ ******

"He did what?!"

Hannibal doesn't let any emotion reach the surface of his expression, but in his heart he is quite amused by Jack Crawford's anger management issues. Dr. Bloom is trying to be the voice of reason, but Hannibal can hear the distress etched to her voice even though she's trying her best to hide it. The doctor is often more worried than she lets on. "Calm down, Jack."

Jack seems like a vein in his forehead is about to burst. Hannibal leans back onto the desk, hands crossed over his chest and his gaze jumps between Dr. Boom and Jack Crawford. He doesn't say anything for the meantime; he finds interactions between these two fascinating. "Will Graham," he pauses, gauging her with his eyes to make sure that his words are sinking in, "Took off to face a psychotic killer by himself. Don't tell me to calm down."

He isn't quite yelling at her – all three of them in the room know he would never dare – but he's so unrelenting one could mistake him for being hostile. Dr. Bloom, however, isn't taken aback by his aggression. "You can't be sure about that."

"I'm pretty sure the note he left at the office of the motel he was staying in confirms it."

"All he wrote was that he was going to take care of something and would check in."

"And now he isn't answering his cell."

"I don't see why that should instantly switch on so many red lights."

"Which is precisely the reason I'm the FBI detective and not you."

Now it's time for Hannibal to step in. "I believe what Dr. Bloom is trying to say is that we shouldn't hurry to jump into conclusions. It is fairly possible that he might have merely set his phone on silent." That's unlike Will, but Hannibal must tell a lie in order to pull the two away from each other's throats.

And Jack knows it. "Do you really think Will would just turn off his phone like that?" He asks, admiringly skeptic.

"No, but it is possible. He might have forgotten to switch the sound back on after visiting the last crime scene. Maybe he only went grocery shopping. I agree that it's unnerving, but I think we should rule out a few of the more average scenarios before we go straight for the worst one."

Jack doesn't reply immediately, and when he does, Hannibal knows precisely what his answer will be. He was thinking it himself. "Will Graham isn't average."

Hannibal knows that Will headed out to face the murderer. It's clear to him; he has taken quite enough interest in Will in the past weeks to be able to roughly map him in his head. Only roughly, because Will's mind forts stand strong in guarding Will's soul. Hannibal is getting there, slowly yet efficiently digging his way under them toward that ingenious mind that could not be more intriguing to Hannibal, step by step gaining a bit of his trust - but he isn't there yet. The way to Will still stretches long ahead of him. Hannibal is very eager to explore it. 

Although, by now he can estimate; he can make assumptions – they're only assumptions, although they're educated – based on Will's complex character. And his assumption is that Will is off to catch a killer, since he is too close to let him get away. Despite that, Hannibal tells Jack to take a few steps back with his probably correct theory. The outcome of their encounter might be interesting, and also in order to create a more efficient environment to solve the question of Will's whereabouts. Not that Jack Crawford cannot function angry and under pressure – No, Hannibal is actually rather impressed by his talent of doing so – but it's the people around him that struggle to function under his anger and pressure.

And as if on cue to Hannibal's thoughts, Beverly Katz enters the office, and her face indicates that she's trying to assess her boss's mood before she speaks. "The computers crashed."

Jack rubs a hand over his face. "Someone was supposed to come and fix the problem a week ago." He says, half-sighing, absolutely reluctant to deal with this right now.

"I did manage to get a trace from the GPS in Will's phone before they crashed."

Alana jumps. "You're tracing Will's phone?!"

Jack chooses to ignore her for now. "Where is he?"

"On a highway, route 43. He was in motion, before the computer shut down."

Jack shoots orders. "Get someone to wake up the computer as soon as possible."

Alana tries again. "Jack, you can't! It's a blatant violation of Will's privacy and –"

"I would install a chip in the back of his neck if it meant keeping him safe, Dr. Bloom!" Jack darts to her, his voice raised and abounding finality. Of course, he doesn't really mean that and they all know it's a onetime deal, but his message is clear and Dr. Bloom has no answer to that. Jack continues, "If he went to chase this killer he must have figured out where he'd be hiding. But, since he didn't share with the group, it's the only option we have."

And silence falls over the room as Katz leaves. Alana seems like she's drawn deep into herself, absorbed in thoughts. Jack is texting, and Hannibal hardly cares who he is texting to. His attention is focused on the bulletin board. His eyes jump from one picture to another, bright images of children smiling to a camera in a way they never will again.

This series of murders affected Will deeply – not necessarily because they were children, but because they were particularly cruel. The crueler a murder is and the closer he gets to it, the more in tugs on Will's soul, like a fish hook that digs deep into it and pulls, bit by bit tearing it out of him. In their sessions Hannibal can read Will's brand new set of violent nightmares in the wrinkle between his eyebrows. Therefore it makes perfect sense that Will's mind will be working over time, going in and out of itself and overlapping the crimes, and has managed to figure out the hideout of the criminal. Jack and Alana try to keep him from getting too close, but it is futile. Nobody can put Will's mind on a leash. Will can't even do that.

So Hannibal does what he can in order to set it free – and channel it to the right places, as he tends to think of them. He leans back onto the desk, crossing both his legs and arms, and patiently waits. It shouldn't take long.

Twelve minutes later, Katz announces that they have a read on Will's phone. Jack fires orders as they he and Jack head out, the influx cut off by the closing elevator doors. Alana Bloom reluctantly stayed behind, having set a session with Abigail Hobbs later that day. She told them to be careful and watched the door close behind them. It's best; If things turn awry, she'll hold them back. All it should take is Jack and him, two fast thinking individuals, in their own ways.

Jack is driving like a madman, but Hannibal isn't fazed by that. He looks ahead at the road as Katz is giving them directions over the phone. His lips curl into half a smirk when she gets the instructions wrong and Jack curses sharply, swerving back and heading back the direction they came from. After twenty minutes of this, Katz informs them that Will had stopped by a lake that Hannibal never heard of.

Jack, however, appears to know exactly where this lake is – Hannibal gathers from the way Jack suddenly drives more independently, not waiting for Katz's instructions. "What's he doing now?" He asks Katz.

"He's not doing anything. He's just standing – dammit!" They can hear a muffled bang on the other side of the phone as Katz hits the computer, "It died again."

Jack releases a deep sigh. "We'll manage from here. Get the damn thing fixed," he emits and hangs up.

"Do you think Will can handle the murderer on his own?" Hannibal turns to him.

"I think it'll take more than one man to handle him, no matter who that man is." He's silent for a few moments and then asks, "Has Will told you anything during your… conversations?"

Hannibal conquers the grin that tickles his lips at Jack's word choice. "I'm afraid I don't have much more knowledge of this development than you do, Jack," He says, "I can tell you that he was very much distraught by these murders. It would be reasonable to assume he wanted to get them over with."

"Will is always distraught. It's the price of imagination." He is repeating Dr. Bloom's words.

"Will's imagination tends to run away without him," Hannibal observes, "He is very capable of keeping up but he doesn't necessarily wish to. What he can see scares him, so he tries to stay one step behind of his imagination. You can say it's a form of defense mechanism. When he makes himself look he keeps up. It takes a toll." He once told Will, _what you need is a way out of dark places when Jack sends you there_. But it isn't important to mention it to Jack that Will is forced to face the full meaning of what he sees mostly when Jack pushes him to it. There is no need to re-enact their conversation about broken ponies. "When he gets too close he's forced to face the full meaning of what he sees. He can't run from it all the time. Hence the nightmares."

"He told me this was bad for him. Do you think it's bad for him? Looking at all of this in the white of the eye," Jack asks as he takes the final turn and the lake is revealed to their eyes.

"He needs a brake. Think of Will's mind as a black hole, but one that can eject things as well. It can provide great insights, but when prodded too aggressively it can tear open and recoil, sucking everything in instead. The anchor Will needs should be grounding him, preventing him from being lost in it when he can't keep himself out."

Jack doesn't answer. Instead he turns off the engine and prepares to exit. Hannibal opens his door and adds nothing. Will needs and anchor, Hannibal is his paddle. A sudden association to Charybdis crosses his mind: the whirlpool from Greek mythology that along with the rock shoal Scylla, posed an inescapable threat to ships. The difference is, if Will is the ship in the metaphor, then Charybdis is right on board of it, and the anchor will be found off it.

Someday, Hannibal muses, maybe he will become Will's Charybdis. But not just yet.

The shore is completely empty and Will is nowhere in sight. There's not a sound except for the soft waves and the winds that is rather chilly. But no Will, or the killer he went to search for. Jack does a 360 degrees turn, eyebrows furrowing. Hannibal raises a hand to shadow his eyes from the sun and gaze far out. He manages to see Will's car about a two hundred meters from them. "Jack," he draws his attention and points to it. But they don't head toward it because it's at this moment when they suddenly hear Will crying for help.

They both turn their heads to the water in the blink of an eye, squinting. Between the more violent waves in the distance, they can see Will, struggling against them but apparently failing.

"Oh my god. Will!" Jack yells, but Hannibal doesn't waste time. In a swift motion his jacket and shoes are rendered on the sand and he's moving toward the water. "Dr. Lecter –"

"Call 911." He cuts him off and dives in. The cold doesn't overwhelm him; he used to go for morning swims in the freezing water of the Baltic sea, then later on in the cold water of the English Channel. He doesn't so much as flinch before his body ultimately adjusts to the cold. He glides underwater, through the quiet below the waves for a moment, before rising up to the surface. He can see Will closer now, but Will isn't shouting anymore. When Hannibal reaches him he's already full body under the water, sinking towards the bottom. Hannibal takes a breath and dives in; he wraps his hands around Will's waists and pulls up, lifting Will and himself above the water. Will is heavy, Hannibal can't deny. He's difficult to carry along, and it isn't helping that both of them are dressed in heavy-when-soaked clothes that drag them both down. However his grip of Will is firm and he swims away towards the shore, pulling Will along with him.

By the time they reach the beach, he's heaving and coughing out water. He pulls Will out of the water and lays him supinely on the sand. He doesn't dawdle on catching his breath and soon enough he's checking on Will: he isn't moving and he isn't breathing.

With Jack towering over him Hannibal begins performing CPR. One, two, three, four, five. He sets Will's head backward and presses his mouth against his, blowing in air. Again. Again.

"Come on, Will, come on," Jack murmurs above him. Hannibal keeps going, and doesn't stop even when Jack's stiff touch of his shoulder prods him to accept what Hannibal isn't willing to accept. The anti-climax would be too great – Will Graham will not die so abruptly, not before Hannibal has executed his plan for him. He feels some kind of sweet irony in the act of granting a life rather than taking them, for once; like the lion that set the mouse free rather than eat him on the spot. Not all the means of achieving his purposes come down to delivering death, even if it isn't as stunning. But most of all, Will Graham won't give in this quickly. It isn't in his nature. He just needs, as always, a little help getting back. A sense of direction that Hannibal, as the paddle, must provide.

This is not their design. And, after ten minutes, Hannibal gets his way as always.

Will heaves, eyes opening wide and then squeezing shut again. He desperately gasps for air through his lungs that are swimming in water. He's choking at the beginning but slowly manages to draw enough breath to cough them out, a blissful Jack thumping on his back. He coughs out so much water that it almost seems as if he's drowning on the inside, but eventually he succeeds in clearing out his lungs. Hannibal leans back, giving him space and trying to catch back his own breaths. Their breaths overlap, Will's shrieking ones with Hannibal's labored ones, and those are the only voices – aside from the waves – until the sirens of the ambulances draw near.

  
**__________ ******

He's already wrapped in three blankets of varying thickness, but Jack insists they wrap another towel over him. He's cocooned so tightly he can't move, but he doesn't care – his teeth stopped chattering and his lips had regained color, but he was still incredibly cold. He's sitting at the edge of the ambulance's open door, after practically begging to Jack not to take him to the hospital. All he wants to do, at the moment, is take the warmest shower he's ever done and sleep for a year.

He's almost certain he's seeing Dr. Lecter and Jack conversing far from him, but he can't tell for sure. His glasses were lost under water, so distant figures are blurry. His doubt is removed soon enough though, when suddenly the figures become larger as they approach him, wearing the faces and forms of the two men. They stand right in front of him, Jack with the expression of a mixture between relief and anger, and Hannibal who – ridiculously quickly – is already halfway dry and tidied up. Jack is glaring at him and Will knows exactly what he's waiting for before he starts, and he figures that giving the circumstances he didn't really earn the right to refuse. He makes eye contact.

"What were you thinking."

He doesn't put it as a question. "I wasn't," Will grates between his teeth. His head hurts too much to argue with Jack. Plus, it's the truth.

"More goddamn luck than brains, Will! If Dr. Lecter and I hadn't arrived in time, it would have ended in the worst way possible!"

Will bites his bottom lip and lowers his gaze. Jack sighs, and Will knows he's rubbing a hand over his face.

"What made you come here?"

Will looks at Hannibal briefly. "He, uh, he took them from here, not from the hiking trip that followed. They were all still dry when they were last seen. He took all four together from the camp and made the others watch as he killed them one by one," he winces slightly but keeps going. "Michael Bradbury was the only guide without a strong alibi, but he got away before the FBI could catch him."

"There were three kids." Jack refutes.

"Four."

"How do you know?"

Will draws deep into himself, reluctantly places himself in Bradbury's shoes. The pendulum swings and he can see Bradbury, along the shore, and he tries to explain. "Bradbury was obsessive, and precise. He didn't hide the bodies so the police wouldn't find them – not as the primary motive – but so he could periodically reclaim them. Like a dog that buries a bone in the ground. He was planning ahead and kept… leftovers," The choice of words tastes so awful on his tongue, but it's the most accurate description of the situation. "He struck once and made sure he'd have enough of what he got for a long time, before he needed to do it again."

"We dug up the bodies."

"And yet there wasn't another murder, even though people come here with their families all the time. On warmer days."

Jack swallows. "What was he doing with them?"

Will closes his eyes. "He was a necrophile."

Jack swears under his breath and then pulls out his radio. "Scan this place for a child's body. Go around the whole lake if you need to. Find it." He says firmly.

Hannibal turns to him. "How did you know to come here right now?"

Will's eyes are still shut as he speaks. "His preciseness was absolute. I understood it this morning," He understood it in a nightmare, but he didn't mention that. He has a feeling Hannibal gathers it without him having to say it. "He wouldn't settle for anything less than the absolute pleasure of the first time he laid his hands on those children, so he kept re-enacting it. He, uh, thought they were expecting him. Didn't want to let them down being late."

Hannibal completes the thought. "So he returned for them at the exact same time each day. The same time he killed them."

"Yeah. I knew when he'd be here," His breaths are shaky. "There was no time to tell anyone, I'm sorry –"

"It's alright, Will."

He clenches his jaw, but allows his body to relax. "Thank you, Dr. Lecter," He says finally to his savior.

Hannibal smiles in a reassurance. "I'm sorry I couldn't save your glasses."

A snicker escapes Will's lips. "I think my number has gone up anyway."

Hannibal snickers as well. "Don't make it into a habit," he pats Will's shoulder once and turns to Jack. "Would you have any objection If I took Will home?"

"Are you sure he doesn't need to see a doctor?"

"I assure you, he will be alright."

Jack consents and turns to Will. "Don't, ever, do that again."

Will nods. Jack turns away from them, and Will clumsily tries to break out of the blankets and towels cage before Hannibal offers his assistance. He leads him to the car, placing him in the passenger's seat. He turns the heating up at maximum as he sits in the driver's seat and revs the engine. "Let's get you out of the wet clothes." He says as he drives away from there.

Will rests his head against the car window and his breaths finally stabilize. His eyelids are heavy with exhaustion from the effort of swimming, and the fact that he isn't cold anymore, but rather cozy, promotes his body's volition to sleep. "You don't have to drive all the way back to Wolf Trap." He murmurs, his eyes sliding shut.  


"It's no trouble at all," He hears Hannibal saying.

Will exhales deeply. Not even the fact that the murderer got away fazes him. Right now all that matters to him is that he feels almost safe. "Thank you," he repeats quietly. "For everything." If Hannibal replies, Will doesn't hear it.

When he wakes up the next morning in his bed, a note in Hannibal's slanted handwriting is placed next to it. It brings a small smirk to his lips.

_They've found the fourth body. Although I reckon you might have seen enough water for a lifetime, make sure to drink when you wake up._  
 _Hannibal._  


**Author's Note:**

> Please, comment and kudos :)


End file.
